Colouring Grandpa
by reminiscent-afterthought
Summary: [AT/time-travel] People become blinded by rage, and that rage is bred by tragedy. In retrospect, it's easy to see where they've gone wrong, but fixing it isn't going to be easy. Still, they have to stop SIN's rampage and the war from escalating as far as it did, and if it means transcending time and wiping out their own existence, then they'll do it - and at its core is Flit Asuno.
1. in the shade of angel wings

**A/N:** Written for

The Gen Novel Bingo, #030 – mark  
Chapter Set Boot Camp, #019 – 36 chapters  
Diversity Writing Challenge, m13 – time-travelling! AU

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 **Colouring Grandpa**

Chapter 1  
 _in the shade of angel wings_

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 _AG 115, Aliston base, Nora Colony_

He considered sneaking out, but Vargas would likely ground him if he was caught. Or, since he was Emily's grandfather and not his own, more likely he'd take the Gundam out for a test drive first under the pretext of punishment and Commander Bruzer would probably approve for the same reasons.

The old man was probably looking for an excuse to get the honours. And he wasn't the only one. The Gundam had been long since coveted after all, and yet they wouldn't argue that the one who deserved the honour the most was him. Even the ones displeased he was just a fourteen year old child couldn't deny the hand he'd had in developing the mobile suit and couldn't deny it was his heritage.

And he wouldn't hand it over to anyone else. The white Gundam: the heritage of his family that had, aside from the handheld device his mother had passed to him with her dying breaths, had been lost in the flames of Ovan. But the portrait of the legendary saviour still consumed his mind. Far enough that some thought him obsessed in the Gundam, in the early stages where it didn't look feasible in the least and certainly not competitive. But he'd proved them wrong. A mobile suit that had taken years to fashion on plans that should have become obsolete before its production even began – but he saw that problem before the first seeds of dissent were sowed and he worked to cover it. Because that was what one did with their machines, and in other aspects of life as well. They found their weaknesses, and then covered them: turned them into strengths.

And so the AGE system was born. He worked on it with different people for the most part, so when the two things came together, it swept the military as a whole off its feet. It was still theoretical, both systems, but the calculations spoke positively and next was the trial. Years of work finally showcasing its worth and its rewards. But now that the moment was almost here, he was impatient. He wanted to raise the Gundam to his feet right _now_ – and that might be the last time he ever sat in its cockpit.

The thought hit him like a pang, far stronger than the – admittedly childish – desire to be the first to move its limbs. To have worked all this time towards a machine that would, if not tomorrow than another day, find itself in a new home, with a new pilot. If they ironed out the kinks relatively soon, it'd be Largan Drace and Largan was a nice guy. Not the legendary white wolf but who knew what the white wolf was doing these days and Dique was the one who talked about him anyway. But as far as the Earth Federation pilots at Aliston went, Largan Drace was the best on the base and it went without saying that the best pilot got the new prototype mobile suit set to surpass all the current models. A fourteen year old civilian wasn't even a possibility, once the Gundam passed its final trials. And yet… the thought made him feel hollow and the Gundam hadn't even left his hands. And the device his mother had passed onto him was still here, in his room.

He rolled over and felt for it in the dark. Its shape was comforting, and its warmth, but it did nothing to quell that restless emptiness that welled inside of him. He wouldn't sleep like this – As if there'd been a chance anyway, he thought to himself, slightly amused. He'd had that dream again. Ovan burning. He never did get to sleep after that but usually he tried. He couldn't even muster that up now. Or, rather, he was too riled up to settle back down.

He had school tomorrow. Already, his eyes were burning and there was the test drive too and that would be dangerous or useless if he couldn't keep his eyes open. But even that wasn't enough to coax him back to sleep.

Perhaps he should just skip school tomorrow. Between the Gundam trial runs and the impending attack from the UE (though, granted, the military was only marginally working to tackle that problem and mostly because they didn't believe designing a mobile suit meant his prediction of the UE attack patterns had any merit), he wasn't going to be concentrating anyway.

He sighed and got out of bed and felt around for his light switch. It blinded him momentarily as it always did and he made a mental note to make them gradually brighten instead. But it wasn't the first time he'd made such a note and no doubt he'd forget about it again.

And he did forget, when he spread his map of the space colonies out on his desk and resumed his calculations. The UE were responsible for Ovan, and another colony. And it only took three points to make a vector and then the results would be indisputable but would they seriously wait until Nora was destroyed? The measures Commander Bruzer was taking were too rudimentary. He'd seen the evacuation plan. He'd seen the projected fighting strength of the UEs as well and they had no proof the Genoace, the best mobile suit on the market at the moment, would be effective at all against the UE machines. The Gundam would, if the trial runs succeeded, because the AGE system would make it so. With the right data, it would defeat any enemy.

The white Gundam that would be the saviour of mankind. And the avenger as well. There wouldn't be any other colonies like Ovan. But would it be enough to save a Nora that lost the gamble the military had put their stock in? Or perhaps the question was: would it be fast enough? He still couldn't narrow down the time frame. Soon, yes, but soon was minutes, days, weeks… even years. The Diva was in port at the moment: the only ship at Nora who could pull out its core. What would happen when it left port? What would happen if Nora was attacked when there was no way to evacuate its citizens, because the life boats weren't enough and would never be enough. Or… what would happen if the UE struck too fast and too hard: if Nora was set aflame before the people could run into the life boats or the core? These people weren't prepared for a massacre, and unless the Geonaces could handle the UE machines, they weren't prepared to defend from one either.

He brushed aside the map and stood up. He was only getting more worked up with the calculations but gaining nothing of real value – and his need to see the Gundam was now stronger than ever.

Vargas and Commander Bruzer would scold him, but they'd forgive him as well.

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 _AG 164, space, approaching new-Nora Colony_

The Baronche had a presence, even in the nether regions of space, as the flagship of the Bisidian pirates who'd become a thorn in the side of Earth Federation and Vagan alike. They were the police of space, the maintainers of balance, the arcana of the world…

But they were just a ship in a fleet of ships and the problems of the world were far out of their control.

Captain Ash sat at the help and rubbed his brow. He disliked it. The current situation. The way everything had ended up. The cards had been there but they'd all played poor hands and paid the price. If only they could have worked together… But it was easy to say now, he supposed, in retrospect. Easy for him to say before as well, because they'd been friends first and foremost, before circumstances had revealed they were enemies.

But that had turned out to be a lie, hadn't it? He sighed again. There'd been too many lies and that had only served to further complicate the tale. It wasn't just a war between the Earth Federation and the Vagans. It was a war between people who tried to play god, people who wanted to rule and the treasure in space that would give them that power – but was, instead, dooming them all.

He could understand the sentiment. He'd been that glitter-eyed himself. His son was still that glitter-eyed. His father had been once upon a time too, presumably, or so his mother said. He'd never seen it. His father's eyes were always dark, as far as he'd recalled. And he'd cast too big a shadow in front of the sun to ever get out of.

It was a pity. No, it was more than that. He was sure Flit Asuno had been capable of far more than the eradication of the Vagans – and indirectly, their world. It didn't matter that the mars colony was gone. It didn't matter that SID was currently in slumber. The defences of EXA-DB was such that SID would be recreated and begin a new assault on humanity – and that man had created this endless loop that would take the world out in its destruction and let Flit Asunu unknowingly pull the trigger.

 _I hope you're satisfied with our doom._

But the truth of the matter was, Flit loved his family and he loved the world. He could never be satisfied with it. He could never love it, love destruction, no matter how much he searched for it and he knew that. It was the one thing that kept him from truly hating that man, sometimes. The man who'd played such a limited role in his life because he'd rather pursue his military career and his vengeance. But that was all people, in the end. Grodek Ainoa was the same. It was because of him hijacking the Diva that the people of Nora were saved and yet his reasons were self-centred. The later achievements of the Diva were under his leadership and driven by that same self-centred desire and some felt the time he spent in jail to pay for those crimes was unjust. Others felt he didn't deserve to be rewarded for selfishness that had turned out to serve the Earth Federation as a mere side-effect.

Grodek Ainoa and Flit Asuno. He'd never met the first man but the two of them sounded so similar. It just so happened that Flit Asuno had authority on his side: a path paved by other people including Grodek Ainoa himself that let him tear the Earth Federation apart and rebuild it from the ground up so it wasn't as corrupt. But was a man driven by revenge considered pure? Not a chance. And a man like that had blocked ears just like the corrupt he'd cleared off.

 _It might have worked, if things had gone a little differently._

But they were all stubborn fools who didn't want to listen to the voice of the world, weren't they? And now it was too late. In retrospect, he could see all these mistakes and they were with the eyes of a human so who knew how many more mistakes were hidden amongst the rest. If people didn't become clouded by rage. If tragedies didn't create the fires that consumed them and gave birth to that rage. If the Earth Federation hadn't abandoned the Vagans instead of helping them. If the disease had never struck the Mars colonies. If the earth had never become overpopulated in the first place: the thing that triggered the rest of these events like a chain reaction. And if EXA-DB did not exist… and who had thought it was a good idea to put all the knowledge of god into a floating nightmare that no-one could control and then leave it for the lucky treasure hunter to find.

And now – they were going to repeat it all again, play god all over again and the idea was laugable, really. The Earth Federation fought on the front lines but that was the role they took up. The original Gundam sung from the very front like the saviour he was meant to be but he'd fall, and his successors were fleeing the battle and the doomed world.

He knew Kio wasn't very happy about that, but he'd rather fight a fight he had an actual _chance_ of winning. And this could work. Using the information they'd gleaned from the EXA-DB – they, the hypocritical ones who'd tried to destroy it first. But the allure of knowledge was a powerful thing and they'd found this: their hope. Or perhaps their foolishness because people always said they'd do something different if they had the chance but would they really?

'Unidentified ship approaching new-Nora, you are not authorised to land.'

He snorted. The world was about to end and this is what the bureaucrats were worried about?

'We're not an unidentified ship,' he snarked back. 'We're Baronche, the flagship of the Bisidian pirates. What rock have you been living under?'

Probably the one called false peace – and it was about to crumble.

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 _AG 115, Aliston base, Nora Colony_

There it was. The Gundam. Flit greedily drank in the sight – and with a bit of relief as well, because the night guard just waved him in, thinking he was there for some last minute check or something.

Or something was about right. He didn't actually have a plan about what to do. He'd just come because he couldn't stay asleep or away and the Gundam… Well, he supposed it wouldn't be entirely inaccurate to say he was obsessed with it. He touched its leg reverently. It was strong and cold and silent and tomorrow, it would move. The white suit striding across the colony and then after that it would fly into space.

Those who destroyed Ovan would soon get the ragnarok coming to them. A part of him wished it could have been him in the mobile suit delivering that ragnarok but that was just a fleeting dream. He wasn't a pilot. People trained their entire lives for that and he'd been too busy building the Gundam, studying mathematics and electronics and all manners of engineering – and being a child. Commander Bruzer had been surprisingly insistent at that. It was how he'd met Emily, and by extension of her, Dique. And it had been a good thing. They'd had fun together. They helped him settle into Nora, into a normal life aside from the side at the military. They scolded him when he spent too much time (in their opinion; not much in his own) with the Gundam, but supported him all the same. And Emily would run interference with Vargas in the morning as well – though how successful that would prove once they left for school was another matter. Vargas was like a child with a new toy, sometimes, even if he was a grandfather.

'Yo,' said a voice suddenly, and unfamiliar. 'Shouldn't you be in bed, kid?' Flit started and whipped around. The night guard was running up as well, babbling something about an identification and the speaker made an annoyed sound. 'Here, here. Sheesh, all you stiff military…'

'I'm sorry,' said the man, but he sounded mystified as well as apologetic. 'I wasn't told –'

The man waved a hand. And he certainly didn't look like military personal, bedraggled like that. 'I'm not here on anything official. Just…seeing the sights, I suppose you can say.'

The guard hovered, but eventually went. After all, the Aliston base wasn't restricted to the mobile suit hanger.

'So this is the original Gundam,' said the man thoughtfully, after the guard had left. 'And you must be Flit Asuno.'

'Yes, sir,' said Flit warily. His hair was a bit of an unfortunate flag at times. 'I don't recognise you.'

'Suppose not.' The man grinned. 'My name's Captain Ash.'

'Captain?' Flit raised an eyebrow. _And no surname?_ 'Of a battleship?'

'Yep.' The man sounded proud. 'She's a beauty. You'll see her soon, probably. But can't really give a tour in the middle of the night and half the crew asleep.'

'Suppose not.' There was already the Diva docked though, and he knew the captain's name was Dian Fonroid. Perhaps the military _was_ considering the threat to the colony appropriately after all. 'Can't tell you much about the Gundam either,' he said, 'considering the engineers are all asleep. Hopefully.' He added the last part because Vargas was an overgrown child. He wouldn't be surprised if the other man wasn't asleep either. But at least he wasn't here to catch him.

'Don't need them.' Captain Ash waved a careless hand. 'After all, the Gundams are a legacy of the Asuno family.'

Flit frowned at that. Few people knew it. Vargas and Emily. Commander Bruzer and his second in command: Grodek Ainoa. People who'd died in Ovan, the day the angel fell. So who was this guy to have that kind of clearance and know-how? 'What are you doing here?' he asked bluntly.

'Easy,' said Captain Ash, and he was frowning as well. 'There's no-one here to bail you out of hot water if you find yourself swimming in it, you know?'

When Flit tensed, he laughed. 'Easy,' he repeated. 'I'm not an enemy. Isn't there something in here wanting to trust me?' he tapped his chest.

His eyes looked surprisingly hopeful, Flit noted. But the truth was there wasn't. The man was disconcerting and simply that. Unfamiliar and uncomfortable and altogether strange. He was a civilian but he'd met his fair share of military personnel… and yet no-one quite like this Captain Ash. Really, it made him want to trust the man _less_ – and the trust meter was at 0% as it was, considering they'd just met. 'Not particularly,' he snapped.

The man visibly deflated. 'Figures,' he muttered, before turning to stare at the Gundam full force. 'Anyway… She up and running yet?'

'The Gundam?' Was he even supposed to answer that question? He was technically a civilian so military gag orders didn't really apply to him, but the Gundam was his life's work and his family's legacy… 'All Gundam-related inquiries are handled by Commander –'

'What's the date?' the man interrupted.

Flit bristled a little, before blinking at the unorthodox question. But he told the other man the date.

'I see…' mused the man. 'So mobility checks in the morning, and then…' He shook his head. 'Hey kid, did you here? The UEs will be attacking Nora tomorrow.'

'What?' Flit yelped, spinning and almost slipping against the rail. 'Who said that?'

The man tsked, and walked off. 'You haven't worked it out? I'm disappointed, Flit Asuno.'

The Gundam was no longer the centrepiece in his mind. It was the map, and the calculations he'd left sprawled out on his desk. He raced back, passing the night guard on his way out with barely a wave of acknowledgement and probably being too noisy for the middle of the night – but that didn't matter. The man was either yanking his chain or he was right and as much as it galled that he hadn't worked it out to the exact _day_ , if it was tomorrow he needed to see it with his own eyes – or at least see the proof. 'Haro,' he snapped at the green little robot. 'Enter search terms: UE, Nora, projected attack date.'

The Haro whirled in the background and Flit poured over his handiwork. Calculations on top of calculations and the military hadn't even believed Nora was a legitimate target of intervention by the UE and now suddenly this? What had changed? Or, if he was being misled, what did the mysterious Captain Ash have to gain? He was a fourteen year old civilian, after all, and even if his legal guardian was the Commander of Nora himself, the man didn't blindly follow his every recommendation. And Flit wouldn't just take the man's words at face value, either.

There had to be something in the calculations he was missing. Or something he hadn't done yet.

'No data, no data,' Haro said, beeping.

Flit sighed. Well, Haro couldn't exactly hack into confidential military files – beyond his clearance, anyway. So that had been a low chance. There'd be an announcement in the morning news if that was true, anyway. Commander Bruzer wouldn't leave the colony in the dark if an attack was confirmed.

But the fact remained that his prediction was off, regardless of whether Captain Ash's words were truth or lie. There was something… And he was going to crack this puzzle _tonight_ , because tomorrow might be too late.


	2. flames bear down on Nora

**A/N:** Written for

The Gen Novel Bingo, #087 – lovely  
Chapter Set Boot Camp, #019 – 36 chapters  
Diversity Writing Challenge, m13 – time-travelling! AU

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 **Colouring Grandpa**

Chapter 2  
 _flames bear down on Nora_

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 _AG 115, Aliston base, Nora Colony_

Emily's knocking roused him from his stupor. He couldn't call it a slumber, because he'd been blinking in and out of consciousness but only felt more tired at the end of it. It was the consequence of late nights: late nights and all the worries that came with them. His dreams, the Gundam, the impending attack by the UE on Nora… and he still hadn't managed to narrow down the predicted date by very much so how the hell had that Captain Ash known?

'I need to stop by the base,' he mumbled, feeling for his terminal and Haro with one hand while rolling up his map and sheets of calculations with the other. They were the most important things. Them and getting some conformation and Commander Bruzer would be able to tell him if it had really been confirmed Nora would be striking today – and what the plan to combat them would be.

 _The Gundam isn't ready yet!_ That was enough to make him panic because the Gundam was supposed to be the white angel, the saviour of the world – and, beyond that, the only new model to be available since the UE's last attack and that attack had proven quite conclusively that all current machines were useless. They had the Genoaces but they were far too inferior. The more skilled pilots might be able to hold off the UE long enough to evacuate the citizens, but there'd be no saving Nora if that was all they had to fight with.

Nora would burn. Just like Ovan.

His grip tightened on the Terminal.

And Emily growled from outside: 'You better open this door, Flit!'

Whoops, he'd left here locked out. He unlocked the door and she stood in the doorway, hands on her hip. 'School,' she reminded.

'Need to stop by the base,' he repeated. 'I was told – ' And then he stopped, because wasn't he suspicious of that Captain Ash character? He knew there was a possibility the man was lying, so should he worry Emily about the details? No; he shouldn't. Emily worried enough about his current level of involvement with the building of the Gundam. 'Something confidential,' he finished.

'Really.' Emily frowned. 'Grandpa works with the Gundam too, you know. He's even planning on taking it for a test drive –'

' _After_ me,' Flit scowled, and that snatched his attention only momentarily because the only thing he obsessed over more than the Gundam itself was the UE and that was because of what they did to Ovan: to his home, and to his mother.

But either Emily didn't see that right then or she ignored it, and it didn't matter because that was precisely what he didn't want to talk to Emily about right then. And so he entertained her teasing and accepted the slice of toast she offered him as they ran down the hall –

Because he had to see Commander Bruzer, and he had to see his Gundam.

Except Flit had been wrong because they were interrupted by Vargas, stumbling in the Gundam but moving nonetheless. And Flit muttered a few choice words under his breath before yelling at the old man. 'What are you doing? That's my job!'

'You've got school, kid,' Vargas yelled back. 'And besides, mobility tests are mobility tests, right?'

And then he stumbled into a container and Emily and Flit shared a wince.

'Look on the bright side,' Emily offered. 'It's Grandpa looking like a drunken fool in a mobile suit instead of you. And it needs tweaking so you'll get your chance at being first again.'

'True, true.' And really, it was plenty obvious the thing needed tweaking still. Firstly, something needed to be done about simple _proportions_. Which idiot had equipped that armoury for a test run anyway? They needed something more balanced and agile first, before they started loading the frame down with armaments. And as far as choice of armaments went, when the AGE system entered its test stages, they'd see plenty of adjusting. Right now they needed a base. Base stats.

Flit raised his voice again. 'Get a more balanced outfitting,' he yelled. 'And tweak the gravity core with –'

'This is my job,' Vargas yelled back. 'You can mouth off in the afternoon when it's your turn on the clock.'

'Speaking of clocks, we're late,' said Emily.

'Still need to stop by the base,' Flit rebutted.

But their path was blocked by someone else.

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 _AG 164, space, approaching new-Nora Colony_

New-Nora wasn't as new as its name. The old colony went down fifty years ago or thereabouts, after all. And on top of that, there'd been very few casualties. Only one noted in the tale: a Commander Bruzer who sacrificed his own life to disconnect the core of Nora from the crumbling colony. They'd abandoned his body in space due to shortage of fighting power. Because, back then, the only thing that could stand up to the Vagans were the Gundams and there was just the one, in its infancy.

Now, there were four in the world and two were aboard the Baronche. One was out of their reach and they may as well say the original was out of their reach as well. But they had the Dark Hound and Gundam FX, and Gundam FX was the inheritor of all its predecessors.

 _We can change the world. I know it._

Kio tightened his grip on the controls. He wasn't looking forward to another fight, especially one like this where they were ones picking the fight, but it was necessary. They needed Nora, and not new-Nora that was scrambling and launching its mobile suit team at the threat of an unidentified mobile suit (though he'd laughed at his father's response to that; the Baronche was infamous, after all). But new-Nora thought it was defending itself and they'd be right. What they were planning would wipe new-Nora from existence whether they succeeded or failed.

But it had to be done. Because the world was doomed if they tried and failed, or if they didn't try at all.

'Mobile suit team has launched from new-Nora space colony,' said the CIC communications officer…who he didn't yet recognise by name. That was the case with most of the Bisidan pirates. They went with nicknames instead and his own father was a case in point, preferring Captain Ash to Asemu Asuno… Even if part of that, he confessed, was his childish desire to distance himself from his father and that overcast shadow of his.

Kio could understand that. His grandfather had a certain… overwhelming presence. But he was luckier. He had the X-Rounder abilities and that meant he could catch up to his grandfather one day: that the potential lay within him to be that great, or even greater. His father had somehow been skipped over by the genes and so he was chasing that dream, those expectations, with a half deck.

And Kio knew all too well how it hurt to be inadequate. It wasn't so much about his family though, with him. It was everybody else. Like Lu and Dean. Like the military who knew how Flit Asuno had been at his age, or even the Flit Asuno of now and expected him to be a ruthless killing machine when he didn't want to kill. But he thought that wasn't fair to his grandfather either. His grandfather hated the Vagans though, even Vagans like Lu and Dean and yet his grandmother had said that, once upon a time, his grandfather had had a Vagan friend as well, but she'd been forced to fight and then killed by another Vagan.

And his father had had a Vagan friend as well. Three generations of Asunos and each of them had a Vagan friend, and yet they still couldn't promote a peaceful understanding. And why? They were all humans, in the end. But earth abandoned the Vagans in Mars and the Vagans grew to hate in turn. And then they attacked the earth colonies that escaped the fate of Mars and the most notable of those were Ovan and Nora, and both of them were home to his grandfather. But he never went to new-Nora with the rest of Nora's people. They settled in Tordia after that… if a lifestyle of constant war could be considered settling at all.

Kio wondered what his grandfather thought of new-Nora. He wondered why they'd never made a new-Ovan as well. There'd been few survivors. The only one the world still knew was Flit Asuno. But it was the Gundam's birthplace as well and Flit could have resurrected that if he wanted to. But perhaps he didn't. He didn't want to find another Yurin l'Ciel either; rather, he thought them all as Desil, even Zeheat who'd been Asemu's friend – and later enemy.

Asemu had told his son the tale. They'd met at SIN, so many years later and the first thing they'd done was fought. They'd fought and almost killed each other with SIN right there, trying to tear them apart as well. It was how deep the hatred of the races went. And how deep the need for information was. A dues ex machina that should never have been allowed to exist but now they were using it instead of ridding the world of it, and not because the ship was manned by a bunch of pirates who didn't care about the fate of the world.

Because they did care about the fate of the world, and they planned on making use of their regrets. Or perhaps it was self-preservation. For some of them at least. But the whole thing could blow up in their faces. Kio was well aware of that. He was also aware that his single Gundam wasn't going to stop SIN. He'd already tried that. The three of them had tried that: three generations of Gundams coming together for this one and only thing –

But if his father's plan worked, they'd be coming together again and much, much, stronger.

'Kio.' And there was his father's voice. 'Are you ready to go?'

'Ready, Dad.'

And he was ready, because they might be working to wipe new-Nora off the map, but its people were and would always be a different story. And he didn't want to kill: not them, and not the Vagans either.

This was the sort of future he wanted, and he'd head towards.

And he was sure his father and grandfather too, once before their friendships grew stained with blood, had wanted the exact same thing.

The Gundams were the saviours of the world, after all. White angels – before they'd been painted red and black with blood.

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 _AG 115, the secondary school near Aliston base, Nora Colony_

They didn't believe him. Flit told anyone he could reach but they didn't believe the UE would target Nora at all, let alone target them _today_. And Commander Bruzer had only said he'd been informed by the mysterious Captain Ash as well and they were working to verify the claim – but to no avail. Captain Ash had pulled the date out of nowhere, it seemed. There was no calculation, no algorithm, no equation to make sense of it.

And Flit was shoved back into his normal life and forced to go on with it. School progressed, after he received a scolding from his teacher for trying to warn them one last time. Emily was frowning at him, and he wondered if she was annoyed he hadn't mentioned the new information to her sooner, or annoyed he was still going on about it. Not even the Commander truly expected the UE to attack Nora, because there was nothing in Nora except for the Gundam they were building.

And there'd been nothing in Ovan except the Gundam too. That made Nora the prime target, really.

'Excuse me.'

Flit turned, surprised. That was a new voice and he thought he knew everyone in his class. Though they'd been late this morning so maybe he'd missed the new person's introduction – and the person _was_ new. Straight and almost shoulder-length brown hair and blue eyes and a seemingly permanent wide-eyed expression as though there was something special about their school. There wasn't really, except it was reasonably close to the base.

'Could I see that map?' the boy asked.

'Who are you?' Flit whispered back.

The boy blinked at him, as though Flit had asked too complicated a question – but then the boy shook his head. 'I forgot,' he said, somewhat sheepishly…and somewhat sadly as well. 'I'm Kio. Kio Ash.'

'Ash as in Captain Ash?' Flit asked, brow furrowing. It was because of Captain Ash that he'd brought the map with him in the first place.

The boy nodded. 'Yep, Captain Ash is my father. I came on the ship with him and his…uhh, crew.'

Flit wondered why he hesitated over that word, but shrugged and handed the map over. If the other boy knew Captain Ash, then he might also know what made the man say Nora would be attacked today. 'Do you know?' he asked, when Kio poured over the map.

Kio's brow furrowed as he read through the pages. 'You're amazing,' he said, almost breathlessly, before shaking his head. 'It's – well, considering how little data you have, it's amazing you've narrowed the Vagan's target down this far –'

'Vagan?' Flit interrupted, before he was interrupted himself by the teacher. But they continued their conversation at lunch, where Kio explained they called the UEs Vagans. 'Because it's sad to call them Unidentified Enemies as though they're aliens,' Kio said, 'especially since they're humans who were sent from Earth into space.'

'How do you know this?' Flit asked. 'Information on the UE is scant. It's the whole reason we can't effectively combat them.'

'They attacked Ovan,' said Kio quietly. 'They killed a lot of people, including your family…and mine.'

'And yours?' Flit repeated. Those blue eyes were sad. Honest. He didn't have a shred of Captain Ash's closed expression and what he said explained a lot.

'And mine.' Kio inclined his head. 'The truth is though, the Vagans aren't all bad. Like us: there are some who choose to be involved in fighting, and others who prefer to stay away, and others still who have no choice in the matter at all. There are people like Dean who's working as hard as he can to earn medicine for his little sister, and people like Lu who draw every day what she imagines the wider world to be because she can't leave her home.'

'The UE's burned Ovan to a crisp,' said Flit. 'Ovan…and Ovan isn't the only place. And your father said they're coming for Nora too.'

'They are,' Kio agreed. 'But if the Earth Federation knew where they were, they'd attack, wouldn't they?'

Flit considered that. 'We have no weapons effective against their mobile suits,' he pointed out. 'We proved that in the last attack.'

'We?' Kio asked. 'Are you part of the military too?'

'Sort of,' Flit hedged. He was a civilian, technically speaking, even if he lived on base due to his connection with Commander Bruzer and the Gundam project… And he worked on a classified military project, even if that was a legacy of the Asuno family that he'd offered the military because he'd had no resources to build the machine by himself. 'It's more of a mutual agreement sort of thing.'

'I see,' said the boy, in a tone that clearly said he didn't, but that wasn't important. 'Do you know the machine you're building will inevitably kill people in its attempt to save the world?'

Flit's eyes narrowed at that. 'You and your father… How do you both know about that?'

'I think you'll find out,' Kio said, almost absently. 'It won't be a pretty sunset. Have you done the mobility tests?'

'One of the engineers is handling it?' Flit grumbled. He still wasn't pleased Vargas had stolen that honour – but Emily had a point in saying it wasn't the complete thing still. But one day soon. 'And you never did answer the question. How is your father so sure it's today? I can't work it out.'

'You have limited data,' said Kio. 'My father and I have friends with the Vagans. Not ones who know military secrets or anything like that. Civilian friends who want nothing more than for us all to coexist in a peaceful world: a world without war.'

'There's a legend,' said Flit somewhat hesitantly, but the boy was suddenly looking so very sad that he had to try. 'About the white Gundam. A long time ago, in one of the great wars back before Earth colonised space, one of my ancestors built a white Gundam hoping its voice would be loud enough to bring the two sides to peace. It sounds impossible, now, for a single machine and a single pilot to change the world like that – but the Gundam outperformed every other weapon and mechanised suit in the era and with that power backing it, it was able to achieve its goal of ending the war. And thus the Gundam became known as the saviour of mankind: the saviour who stopped a war and stopped the people of Earth driving themselves into extinction with its indiscriminate killing.'

'I've heard the story before,' said Kio, 'but a little differently, I think. The Asuno family was well known on Ovan, after all.' But there was something about his tone that made Flit wonder if there was something else. Something… But that something escaped him.

And then the walls shook.

Kio checked his watch. 'It's the Vagans,' he said, and Flit and a till-then silent Emily shot to their feet as well. Flit led the way to the hanger and the others followed willingly enough. Emily's grandfather was there, after all, and Kio's father. All of them had family and their families were crowded around the Gundam when they arrived there.

But the town was already burning as well. So fast, and the alarms had barely begun to sound. It was chaos, suddenly; on the streets or inside the hanger, it didn't matter. They tried to open the shutters but their suits were shot down before they could leave – as though they were practice targets. Flit gritted his teeth. Largan was there, but the Gundam wasn't ready according to Vargas and the Genoaces just weren't enough. Nora was burning. Nora was going to burn.

Emily clutched his arm tightly. Flit reached for Kio blindly – but Kio wasn't there. His eyes darted around: there was Vargas talking with Largan, and Captain Ash watching what was going on outside, and Emily on his arm and Haro bounding beside them – but no Kio.

'Kio?' he whispered to Emily. She shook her head. 'Kio!' he called, louder.

'Quiet, kid,' said Captain Ash, without looking away. 'You're about to see a real Gundam.'

And what the hell did that mean? Flit just stared agape at the man: at his audacity – and at his claim. There was only one Gundam in the world right now and it was the incomplete model behind them… Unless they'd dug up a past relic? Those still existed?

But that meant…

The barrage against the door was suddenly stopped. There was something flashing blue amidst the purple of the enemy suits and the red of the flames. Something flying too fast to catch in the gaps in the shutter and the gaps were too small to see, until Captain Ash opened the shutter.

'Really, Captain,' Vargas muttered. 'You better be right about this.'

'Don't worry,' said Captain Ash. 'Even your prototype Gundam could handle these guys, so you don't have to worry about this bad boy at all.'

And the shutter rolled fully back to reveal what Captain Ash had claimed to be a Gundam, and Flit could only stare at it, because his own Gundam was still in its infancy in comparison.


	3. together the gundams stand

**A/N:** Written for

The Gen Novel Bingo, #070 – pathetic  
Chapter Set Boot Camp, #019 – 36 chapters  
Diversity Writing Challenge, m13 – time-travelling! AU

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 **Colouring Grandpa**

Chapter 3  
 _together the gundams stand_

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 _AG 115, Aliston base mobile suit hanger, Nora Colony_

There was a Gundam. And not bare and incomplete and barely able to move like the one he'd made, but complete: fully mobile and darting between one mobile suit and the next like the avenging angel, the protector it was meant to be.

By the time the shutters had been rolled all the way up, the battle against the two enemy mobile suits were over.

'That's…' Flit breathed, 'the power of a Gundam.'

Captain Ash came over and put a hand on Flit's shoulder. 'Don't worry,' he said. 'Your Gundam will keep pace once it's kept pace a bit more and you've grown as a pilot in it.'

'Hold on just a minute,' Vargas interrupted. 'Largan's the pilot of that mobile suit.'

'Really?' Captain Ash raised an eyebrow at Flit.

Flit stared at his feet because no way was he going to admit to this captain that came out of nowhere that a part of him _did_ want to pilot the Gundam he built. 'Largan Drace,' he said instead. 'He's the top pilot here so it's only fitting he get the honour of piloting the latest model.'

'Well,' Captain Ash shook his head. 'I'll grant you, Largan Drace has a reputation, but he doesn't have your reflexes.'

'My reflexes?' Flit wondered, before ducking as the other tried to cuff his ear. 'Hey!'

'Reflexes,' Captain Ash repeated, looking smug. 'That and the genius head on your shoulders can do better than being stuck in that crappy school –'

'Hey,' frowned Emily, hands on her hips and mirroring her grandfather's discontent. 'Who are you to come in here and start talking like that anyway?'

'Captain Ash,' said the man simply. 'Captain of the Baronche. She's docked next to the Diva at the moment and in the midst of blanket repairs – since we're going to be taking off in a hurry.'

'Captain Ash,' Vargas repeated. 'Of the Baronche. I haven't head of that ship, before.'

'You wouldn't have.' The man looked amused. 'We're the world's ace in the hole, so to speak. I do have a valid Earth Federation ID; isn't that enough?'

Vargas sighed. 'True, it's near impossible to fake those things, but it would help if you had a recommendation. These are some top secret military projects you're talking about.'

'One project,' Captain Ash shrugged, 'and seeing as we have a Gundam of our own, I don't think you need to be too concerned with us stealing anything from you. Though we could use some help in building the AGE system. We lost our own one…' He frowned to himself. 'Just after Kio was born. I don't even remember how long ago that was, now.'

'You know about the AGE system?' Flit asked incredulously.

'We had our own, once,' Captain Ash repeated. 'That was before the Baronche though. The ship I was on got destroyed and the AGE system with it. I could fix the Gundam up, but that thing's another story.' He shrugged. 'Still, it's held up alright. We humans though, we're always pushing our limits. Eventually, we'll escape the machine and that's where the AGE system becomes even more important…'

'We haven't trialled our AGE system yet,' Vargas said, casting a side-long glance at a downcast Flit. No doubt the boy was wondering if the idea had been as innovative as he originally thought. He'd taken great pride in the design, building off the bare backbone of something not even recognisable as a cohesive system amidst the data on the Gundam and turning it into something that would support the Gundam's evolution. And it was mind-boggling. The Gundam was the state of the art mobile suit and the AGE system would ensure it was always competitive (assuming it worked out like they planned it to), and yet here was Captain Ash and his boy and they'd pulled a far flashier and more competent Gundam out of the blue, and now they claimed they'd had the AGE system available to them as well. How had they done it? And why, if that was the case, couldn't they simply rebuild it?

'It works,' said Captain Ash. 'Trust me.'

'You haven't exactly given us a reason to trust you,' the engineer replied, to which Captain Ash sighed and shook his head.

'We defended you lot from two enemy machines,' Captain Ash pointed out. 'Or, rather, Kio di – watch out!'

They stared at him, then outside where he'd been the first to notice a third machine. Kio in his Gundam immediately fired at it – but the two machines he'd disabled were smoking by that time regardless. Captain Ash simply put a hand over his brow and sighed. 'Sorry Kio. No-one mentioned that.'

And nobody knew quite what to say to that statement, either. Because it made no sense to them at all. Unless the man knew a Vagan – a UE – involved in the attack so intimately he could tell exactly when the colony would be attacked – but not that they'd rather destroy their own kind and keep their secrets than let themselves be captured by the enemy?

But Kio had one unidentified mobile suit mostly intact and its pilot unconscious, at least. And he was still in his mobile suit cockpit so none of them could see his reaction to the other two, but Captain Ash had a pitying look on his face, as though he could guess.

And if they really were father and son, perhaps he could guess, if he knew his son that well.

And in any case, the rest of them gathered there had more to worry about than the relationship between father and son.

'Fair point,' Vargas admitted. 'And since you two know about the Gundams, your information is invaluable to any…snags we hit along the way. Still, Commander Bruzer has the final say. You'll have to report to him at headquarters…and take your kid and his fancy suit and that pilot you've captured along with you.'

'And an escort?' asked the man, slightly cheekily. 'We're new here, after all. Never set foot on Nora in my life before yesterday, and Kio's the same.'

'Hmmph,' said Vargas, wondering now doubt how the man had found the Gundam's mobile suit hanger if that was the case. 'Fine. Largan?'

'My machine's damaged,' Largan reminded him sheepishly, wincing as he rolled a shoulder and adding he was lucky his body hadn't followed suit, considering how quickly the UE machines had fired on them. They hadn't even gotten the shutter halfway open before he'd had to pull back his machine!

'Then take another Genoace,' Vargas snapped. 'You need a working machine for the Diva anyway.'

The man saluted and led the way, with Captain Ash walking casually behind and calling to his son as they passed.

'Vargas,' Flit began, once they were out of earshot.

'He was right,' Vargas pointed out. 'Many things can be fabricated, as far as information goes because of how dependent we are on remote communication and storage. But the Earth Federation IDs have a physical identification chip in them and those can't just be made from nothing. Hard information is always safer, after all. And you know that very well. It's why your device is remote.'

Flit did know that. But Captain Ash was still an enigma, and hardly a flattering one. In a day and a bit, he'd made light of all of Flit's hard work and his dream Gundam had sat in a hanger and watched another Gundam, beyond his wildest dreams, dance with the UE mobile suits.

'Isn't it great?' asked Emily. She'd been annoyed as well, at first, but it seemed she'd found another advantage. 'There's something that can fight the UE mobile suits finally, and you don't have to go out there.' The smile quickly morphed into an angry frown. 'And don't deny it. You wanted to go out there, didn't you? You're not even a soldier!'

'I know that,' Flit snapped back at her. 'I know I'm not a soldier, that I'm just a civilian and I have no business fighting in that mobile suit I built and helped build but the Gundam is the only link to my family I have. And it's supposed to be my family's: the Asuno family's. So how the hell does that guy know so much about it and how the hell did he manage to build one like _that?_ And what about the AGE system? That's new! Mine!'

Vargas covered his ears as Flit's voice rose. He'd known it was coming and it was a pity it was Emily bearing the brunt of it, but if those two were going to stay friends as adults, they needed to make it past that particular hurdle in any case. And Emily could handle herself against her childhood friend. She'd dealt with a grieving Flit that bit at every hand that came near, after all, and that was directly after Ovan. She could handle a Flit whose biggest wounded part was his pride.

'You made it to protect people!' Emily snapped back. 'That means the best pilot should be in it, not a complete novice. You wouldn't even know what to do out there. What if you killed people? What's what the military does!'

'I _know_ that.' Flit gritted his teeth and tapered his tone. 'I know all that. I know that I know pretty much nothing about how to pilot a mobile suit in combat; I can only do performance tests. And I know I was never meant to keep it. But it's still –'

Vargas put a hand on his shoulder. 'Since Largan's gone,' he said, 'how about you take the Gundam over to the Diva. It's going on board and the evacuation order's still in effect.'

'Right…' said Flit. 'The evacuation order.'

'Right,' echoed Emily, before sighing. 'Flit, sometimes I think you _want_ to fight the UE. Please tell me it's not true.'

But he couldn't tell her that, because maybe it was a little bit true.

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 _AG 115, en route to Aliston base military headquarters, Nora Colony_

Captain Ash rode on the Gundam-FX's shoulder, because it was faster that way and he could talk to his son without any passer-byes listening in.

'At least that guy's safe,' he offered.

'Safe is relative,' Kio replied. 'What will the military _do_ with a Vagan?'

'I have no idea,' Captain Ash admitted. 'I don't think there's ever been a Vagan taken prisoner by the Earth Federation. Or will be ever. This timeline stuff is confusing.'

'Worse is that we've got second-hand information.' Kio sighed. 'I wish we'd known about them attacking their own machines to keep them out of our own hands… And why even bother? The colony's going down in a matter of hours, isn't it?'

'It is,' sighed the Captain. 'Unfortunately, since we didn't know their entrance point, it was a stab in a dark when we spread our net and we missed them entirely. The only places we're sure are targeted are the original Gundam's mobile suit hanger and the military headquarters where the trigger to releasing Nora's core is located.' He shook his head. 'Frantically pouring through archived reports and that's all we know. Figures.'

'There might have been more and we just didn't have time,' Kio offered.

Captain Ash smiled. 'Aren't I the one who's supposed to be making you feel better right now?'

'I've already made my peace with killing,' Kio pointed out. 'That doesn't change that I want to save as many people as I can, and yet – ' His voice wavered.

Ash's smile grew more tender. 'That's fine,' he said. 'You don't ever have to make peace with watching people die in front of you. That makes you human. And you know it's the same with the Vagans.'

'Yeah…' Kio's voice sounded watery, but steady. 'We just have to convince Grandpa of that.'

'And considering how stubborn he is, that's going to be easier said than done.' Captain Ash was grumbling again. He couldn't help himself.

Kio laughed. 'Granted, you didn't seem to have made a great first impression on him.'

'It's fate,' Captain Ash sighed. 'Can't be helped.'

But maybe it could be helped. It was going to be strange, mentoring him, trying to guide him to the right path – but hopefully they could pull it off together.

But, for now, they followed Largan Drace's Genoace up to the military headquarters.

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 _AG 115, en route to ship hanger, Nora Colony_

It was just Flit and Haro now. Everyone else was either evacuating or making their way to the Diva and Flit was doing the latter. The Gundam was slow though. Slow and clunky and he tried to adjust the parameters as he went to make the machine more balanced, at least. It would be bad if there were more of those mobile suits, at least. Or even civilians he needed to dodge around, crumbling structures to navigate less straightforwardly than a plain road.

Emily's words echoed in his head again. _Sometimes I think you want to fight the UE._ And that was the first thing he'd thought of, again. Fighting them. Running into another mobile suit in the colony while the people of Nora huddled inside the core, hoping against hope there would be no further attack now that the colony itself was doomed.

But why would the UE attack the colony to the point of its destruction and then let its people escape? Even if they were humans too, they'd given no warning shots, no time to evacuate. It was only because of the Gundam that the damage had been limited and who knew how many civilian casualties had occurred before that. They'd dragged dead pilots out of their mobile suits in the hangers because they couldn't even sortie before being shot down, and Largan Drace had claimed he'd been lucky to get away with a wrecked Genoace and a sore shoulder and he was probably right. the Genoaces had proven to be entirely ineffective, but the Gundam…

Even if it hadn't been his Gundam to prove it, the Gundam had proven to be an effective force against those unknown mobile suits. But he didn't understand _how_ that other suit existed. The Gundams were an Asuno family secret, after all. So that meant they were related? Another branch of the family, distant enough for his mother to have never mentioned them but not so distant as to have lost the mobile suit technology they'd been building for generations? So then the seeds of the AGE system had been with them as well – but that still didn't explain why they couldn't rebuild it. Unless it was a different system with just the same name – but it sounded the same. Or, at least, it had a similar function. And they'd appeared on Nora…why? Because they'd known the UE were coming? Or because they'd known the Gundam was here?

Would they support him, or rival him?

And that was what was bothering him, he realised. The Gundam was his, his legacy, and the new Gundam and the father and son Ash had shown up to rival that. They'd push his Gundam to new heights, yes, but they were already so far ahead. His life's work was suddenly left feeling…incompetent and that feeling only grew the more he was jolted in his seat.

And then he stopped. There was a girl on the road. When the civilians should have been at the Core by now. Had he walked right past others? He shook his head; he may not have, if he'd noticed her: the young girl in a purple dress and a ribbon in her hair.

He offered a Gundam's hand. The colony was still crumbling.

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 _AG 115, Aliston base military headquarters, Nora Colony_

Commander Bruzer was surprised, to say the least. The man, Captain Ash, was frank but unbelievable. And yet the Gundam he'd brought with him was decent enough proof – because how could they have a functioning Gundam light years ahead of the one Flit Asuno had built when he was the only survivor and heir of the Asuno family and its mobile suit technology.

It was a quick explanation, since the colony still crumbled around them. The Gundam allowed only a cursory glance before Captain Ash set its pilot – Kio – hiding in a vantage point to protect the tower.

'You're expecting another mobile suit in the colony?' he asked, surprised.

'I know there's another mobile suit in the colony,' Captain Ash replied. 'Or, at least one. And it'll come right here.' He sat casually in the seat offered to him: a stark contrast to Commander Bruzer's far more rigid posture. 'But the colony, sad to say, is just a stepping stone. The Vagans want their rights to live as humans in this world. That's all.'

'All is relative,' mused the Commander. 'You've thrown quite a curveball, Captain, and meanwhile Nora is crumbling.'

'It is,' said Captain Ash. 'Your men didn't believe me yesterday. I think even Flit Asuno didn't believe me, and he'd calculated for himself the likelihood of the Nora colony being attacked.'

'He did,' Commander Bruzer agreed. 'But he couldn't narrow down the date because he had no idea of their forces, or the location of their base of operations – ' His eyes narrowed. 'You know that as well, don't you?'

'Yes,' said Captain Ash, unsurprised. 'But forgive me for not sharing it at the present moment. I don't think the backdrop of Nora crumbling is a good setting in which to discuss negotiations.'

'Negotiations?' Commander Bruzer's eyes widened. 'They've destroyed three space colonies and it'll be a miracle if we save Nora's people, at least. The casualties they've inflicted are huge! The people who'd have had families and homes ripped away aren't going to stop screaming for blood long enough –'

'I know,' sighed Captain Ash. 'People like Flit Asuno… And let me tell you, he's a force to be reckoned with but worst of all is his stubbornness.' And then his lips tweaked into a smirk. 'Must run in the family, really. But we need their cooperation. We lost the future because we couldn't cooperate, because there'd been too much bloodshed on both sides to forgive and the earlier we put an end to it, the greater the chance of being able to work together and stopping what'll come otherwise.'

'That's still a lot,' Commander Bruzer frowned. 'And the only proof is that Gundam – and perhaps because it's inconceivable someone else possesses the knowledge to build that, and up and beyond the current one as well.'

'There's more,' said Captain Ash. 'Over fifty years worth of knowledge… and something else as well. The space treasure. The EXA-DB.'

'You have that?' he asked, almost breathlessly. 'That is said to contain all the data of pre-AG technology – the technology that was lost in the colony wars. It contains the secrets to reinhabiting earth, to making weapons of different kinds, to –'

'To transcend time,' Captain Ash interrupted. 'But also to destroy the world – and no, we don't have it. We glimpsed it and it graced us with this one chance while trying to destroy us…and destroying much else aside. The EXA-DB is sentient, and so is its guardian. And in a world where the Vagans and those of us from the Earth Colonies can never see eye to eye, it becomes the avenger that slaughters all of us and wipes clean the world. But…' He closed his eyes and bowed his head. 'If you want to see further proof, come to the Baronche when you leave here. We can show it all to you.'

The Commander didn't get a chance to agree before the Captain was suddenly moving, grabbing the man away from his desk and into the elevator. 'There's another control, isn't there?' he snapped.

The man really did know a lot. 'Yes,' Commander Bruzer said, 'but what –'

'The mobile suit,' said Captain Ash brusquely. 'Can't you hear the blasts?'

Yes. Yes he could hear the blasts.

And Captain Ash's brow furrowed. 'Actually, it looks like the original Gundam is engaged as well.'

So Flit had found that mobile suit first of all.


End file.
